Chapter 867: The Test (2)

He's dead!

Rhode smirked. The Hell Lord talent tree was the most unsuitable in close-combat among the three talent trees. Although the Hell Lord talent tree possessed advantages in awakening the dead into Undead Creatures, its biggest flaw was that it only had a single attribute, where its offense or defense basically held the 'undead' attribute. Although the 'undead' attribute was useful against Undead Creatures due to damage immunity, apart from this, the Hell Lord was the easiest to take down in this situation!

The Dark Rangers' continuous arrows disrupted the movements of the other two Spirit Swordsmen. At the same time, the explosion from the crazy Hell Hound broke the Hell Lord Spirit Swordsman's defense.

The Hell Lord Spirit Swordsman was stunned. He thrust his hand forward quickly, where an enormous skeleton creature emerged and swiped its huge bone claws at Rhode. Rhode had no intention of retreating. Instead, he brandished his blazing blade which clashed with the menacing claw. But at this moment, he discovered a faint white flash from the creature's body, and the creature suddenly became incredibly tough!

At the same time, the ground around Rhode rumbled deeply. Then, stone statues about half of his height emerged from the ground one by one and swarmed toward him. Rhode sulked at this scene.

Darn it!

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Without any signs of warning, the stone statues exploded and razor-sharp stone thorns burst out of the ground, striking the ground where Rhode stood. Fortunately, Rhode dodged and re-emerged from the shadow on the other side. He squinted at the Spirit Swordsman who stood in the dispersed smoke and held a glowing yellow card.

Using the combination of the rule power and card attribute? Not bad at all.

Every being who transcended into the Legendary Stage held their very own rule attribute and Rhode was no exception. This explained why their tactics were all unique. For instance, Rhode's awakened talent, Eternal Fantasy, was lethal when used by him alone. On the other hand, the three skills, namely [Self-Affirmation], [Absolute Presence], and [Igniting Wrath], could also be used effectively against enemy groups when unleashed appropriately. But no matter what, only he could unleash the skills.

On the contrary, some talents were more effective when launched by several attackers. In the past, Rhode fought a Spirit Swordsman, the "Dinosaur Beater", who played the best with this tactic. His individual talent was the 'time-reverse', where he mastered and achieved the effects of casting two skills simultaneously. This tactic wasn't too meaningful for him, but after he coordinated it with his Soul Messenger talent tree and summoned enhanced summoning spirits, the talent skill could instantly defeat a fully-armored Warrior. After all, not anyone could tank double attacks from multiple summoned spirits at once. Not only that, but the 'Dinosaur Beater' could also use this tactic to summon spirits twice in a row to raise his chances of winning. However, he wasn't too confident of his talent back then and although he drew against Rhode from the start of the battle, he eventually lost his cool to Rhode's taunts and was defeated by Rhode's 'annihilate' attribute.

Judging from this, the rule attribute of the Hell Lord talent tree should be 'defense', while the Summoning Master talent tree was 'explosion'?

Rhode puckered his brows. This indeed was a troublesome combination. The Hell Lord Spirit Swordsman's biggest flaw was that the Undead Creatures were weak in defense. Besides, they only had a single attribute, which was easy to overcome. Even though the Summoning Master Spirit Swordsman could summon a huge number of spirits, they would still be crushed when faced with a powerful force since quality over quantity applied in this case. However, with the 'explosion' attribute, it could be said that all the spirits that the opponent summoned would be equivalent to walking bombs. If Rhode guessed correctly, the opponent should be using a deck with the 'earth' attribute... Card decks with the 'earth' attribute often held strong defenses, which was extremely annoying.

On the other hand, Rhode didn't know what the rule attribute of the final Soul Messenger Spirit Swordsman was...

Rhode lifted his head and looked at the Soul Messenger Spirit Swordsman standing silently on the other side. At this moment, the flying fish was hovering around him and the crystal-clear barrier. It seemed like this was the barrier that stopped the Dark Rangers' ambush...

Although the situation was rather difficult, this made things interesting...

Rhode twitched his brow.

"Wow..."

Although the battle had progressed for less than a minute, everyone was dumbfounded as they stared blankly at the arena. Even though there were four of them in battle, it seemed like a battle between magnificent armies with thousands of men and horses. Lize rubbed her eyes in disbelief while Christie placed her hands on her chest and observed the fight.

At this moment, Rhode made up his mind on the battle tactic.

"Attack!"

The Spear Defenders who were in defense formation stood up vigilantly. They raised their shields and spears and dashed forward. The Dark Rangers in the back scattered in all directions with trails of afterimages. Then, a blinding radiance erupted and blasted at the three Spirit Swordsmen.

The three Spirit Swordsmen came to a halt in unison and the Summoning Master lifted his card, when suddenly, hundreds of stone statues broke out from the ground. They braved the magic arrows released by the Dark Rangers while charging toward the Spear Defenders.

Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!

A series of explosions shook the ground. But the Spear Defenders were unaffected. If it were an ordinary human army, perhaps the explosions would have crushed their formation. But it was a pity that the Spear Defenders would not falter with this attribute of theirs.

[Fortification (Formation will not be destroyed)]

Just this attribute was enough to wipe out the opponent's efforts to destroy their formation. Other than eliminating the Spear Defenders, there was nothing else that could split up their formation or stop them. Shortly after, the smoke dispersed and even though hundreds of stone statues were destroyed, the Spear Defenders didn't seem to be hurt at all. They continued to raise their spears and marched forward in large strides.

At the same time, the other two Spirit Swordsmen also launched their attacks.

A whistling cold breeze instantly froze an ice carpet on the ground. On the other side, a skeleton giant emerged out of thin air, hurling its enormous claws at Rhode, who also launched his attack.

"———!"

A gleaming white beam fell from the sky and blasted the skeleton giant. The Ultimate Judges raised their scepters and white, sacred brilliance emanated from their bodies. On the other side, the little mermaid floating in the water ball wittily drew an arc with her tiny hand. Then, she thrust her arms forward and the cold breeze instantly stopped, which frightened the flying fish as it fled quickly.

Now's the chance!

Rhode and his shadow clones sprung out from the shadows, wielding the spotlessly white holy sword, huge scarlet sword with steel chains, and the twin daggers in hand. The three Spirit Swordsmen were stunned by this ambush. But... this didn't mean that Rhode would easily achieve his goal.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

The clashes between blades filled the arena. The scarlet blade mercilessly pierced through the white bone shield and into the skeleton giant's body. However, before it managed to strike the skeleton giant, it was forcefully stopped by two Death Knights. On the other hand, the white holy sword broke the stone statues' defense as it punctured their bodies. At the same time, the twin daggers were negated by an ice wall before they could take down their targets.

The three Spirit Swordsmen retaliated.

"————!"

The Hell Lord Spirit Swordsman widened his left palm and the pitch-black card shattered on its own. Shortly after, countless bone chains struck out to trap Rhode's shadow clones. Then, he darted forward and launched his sword at the shadow clone with the Death Knights. In the blink of an eye, three swords ripped through the shadow clone as it vanished into thin air.

In the middle, an enormous stone statue that was three to four meters tall propelled its fist at Rhode. Almost simultaneously, another batch of a hundred stone statues crawled out of the ground and blocked his escape route. Then, they exploded and after the giant stone statue's punch landed, everything turned silent.

But all it hit was Rhode's shadow clone.

Clang!

It's not as easy as I thought.

Rhode retreated swiftly while the opponent lifted his left hand and an azure card flickered. In the blink of an eye, a strange-looking, ice creature emerged out of nowhere and swung its razor-sharp tail across the sky.

However...

Shing!

As its tail was about to hit Rhode, a dozen tentacles flew out from his shadow and bound the ice creature tightly. Then, Rhode used the chance and pounced on the opponent!

The opponent didn't expect that Rhode would retaliate so soon and he instinctively retreated. At this moment, Rhode had arrived before him with gleaming twin daggers. But a sword flashed and deflected Rhode's attack.

Tsk. Did I fail again?

Rhode sulked at the sight of the man before him who held a sword in his right hand and a card in his left. But shortly after, Rhode's nose twitched to an aroma.

Hmm? This scent... Could it be...

Rhode's eyes glinted.

Yes!

As soon as this thought came to his mind, he hurled the twin daggers toward the opponent. However, the opponent wasn't mindful at all, and he brandished the sword and deflected them. It was because of this that he didn't notice the pitch-black card in Rhode's hand.

Shing———!

The black, viper-like chain sword transformed in Rhode's hand, struck out, and brushed the Soul Messenger Spirit Swordsman's chest. Then, the razor-sharp, surging airstream erupted from its blade. Although the Soul Messenger Spirit Swordsman quickly defended himself, he only managed to stand on his feet firmly after drawing back two steps. However, his armor was shattered by this attack and...

"Ahh!"

Rhode heard a shriek and witnessed two fleshy bosoms jumping out of his, or perhaps her tattered leather armor. The Soul Messenger Spirit Swordsman subconsciously wrapped her arms around her chest and didn't realize that Rhode had arrived behind her.

"This is the end."

Rhode lifted his left hand and landed a punch on the back of her neck. Then, she shambled before collapsing to the ground. Rhode lifted his head and gazed at the two remaining Spirit Swordsmen.

"One down."

He announced.